God’s Provision for Anna

In November, Tim’s volunteer group received a call from Anna, a sixty-five year old grandmother, who was recently diagnosed with the beginning symptoms of Lou Gehrig’s disease. She lived on the outskirts of town, in a doublewide mobile home. Anna needed a disability ramp so she could navigate the steep height of her front entrance.

As Tim visited with Anna, she acknowledged that she had no way of funding the lengthy ramp necessary to meet county requirements. As Tim drove away and neared his own driveway, his eyes caught movement in the neighbor’s backyard.

A carpenter was busily removing a nearly new sixteen-by-forty foot deck from the house which was headed for disposal. Tim quickly made a bargain to retrieve the good-as-new lumber, saving nearly eight hundred dollars worth of treated deck boards. It was exactly what was needed for Anna’s ramp!

Two days later, six volunteers met at Anna’s to begin building her ramp. It was a clear, cool day in early November. Anna proudly served lunch to the workers

She announced, “I suppose you can tell that the soup is venison. I’m sorry if venison isn’t your favorite, but you see, the only source of meat I have had in the past fifteen years is road-kill.”

Complete stillness hung in the air, as the men slowly ingested Anna’s statement. They returned humbly to their task. As the hammers echoed in unison, each volunteer wrestled with the reality of Anna’s candid admission.

Soberly, all six volunteers thanked Anna that afternoon for her hospitality and the fine lunch she had provided. Each left with the same thought re-echoing, “Can this really be true, actually happening to someone here, who supplies her table with road-kill meat?”

Two days later, Phil, one of Tim’s volunteers at Anna’s, called, cheery and excited. “Tim, I am so happy to tell you how I helped Anna. You know I am a beef-farmer, right? Well, Anna won’t have to worry about finding meat ever again. I just brought her a quarter of beef. She cried with happiness! I told her that she will always have her freezer full of beef.”

Tim hung up the phone and thanked God for providing: providing Anna with fresh meat forever; providing the six volunteers with a way to be the Body of Christ for Anna, and for providing Tim with the realization that with God, all things are possible.

“For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.” (Jeremiah 29:11)